Shinjuku

Today we finally, finally, finally made it into downtown Tokyo. We've only been here for four weeks or so, but I've wanted to visit Tokyo for about 3 weeks and 5 days of that time, so I was pleased.

We decided to take the train from Fussa into Shinjuku. Shinjuku is a huge commercial district, the kind of place that guide books love to call "bustling". It boasts the world's busiest railway station (two million passengers a day!), the Tokyo Metropolitan government (housed in weirdly Gotham City-esque skyscrapers) and a huge red light district (we didn't visit that, natch), along with no less than four or five department stores with ten to twelve stories each. It's ...bustling.

In the midst of all of this, is the Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden, which has been a part of Tokyo since the Edo era, in one capacity or another. And this is why I love Japan. The world's largest city, where space of any sort is incredibly expensive, and yet there are green spaces everywhere. And not just little pocket parks, but enormous, sprawling, lavish amounts of green space. The Japanese get so many things right.

It reminds me of Central Park a bit, with its juxtaposition of modern buildings and venerable old trees.

 Anyway, before Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden was a public park, it served as a private garden for the Imperial family, where presumably they entertained themselves by creating various types of landscapes to stroll through. We wanted to see the traditional Japanese garden portion of things, so off we went.

At first, I was highly unimpressed, though it was not the garden's fault. Our large shipment of furniture hasn't arrived yet (it's coming in two days!) so we don't have a stroller suitable for Tokyo yet. The Double BOB jogger is definitely built on American lines, let's put it like that. I was packing Emilia and girlfriend puts off a lot of heat. It was basically like carrying around a small portable furnace in the 90 degree weather. So there was sweat. And there were mosquitoes. Lots of them. We were pursued through the forest portion of the park by blood sucking insects whilst carrying screaming children. I think that might have been one of Dante's levels of hell, but I can't be sure. 

Then all of a sudden we popped out onto a lawn and we were in historical Japan. 



 



There were dragonflies everywhere. I have never, ever seen so many dragonflies, nor been so excited to see dragonflies because it was mosquito free territory. We lolled under some trees and then lolled some more because we were totally defeated by the heat and blood loss.

Staring up into the trees

Perfect patches of shade under each tree

We didn't move an inch, but we suddenly found ourselves in the midst of a flock of ladies that surrounded my children, cooing and snapping pictures and pinching their cheeks and declaring things like "I love you, little babies, you are super kawaii" (rhymes with Hawaii and means cute). Tim and I were slightly bemused because we suddenly experienced what it was like to parent Suri Cruise, minus only the wealth and the looks and the strange alien religion.

We were happy to let the ladies take pictures with the kids, as they (the women) were radiating goodwill and happiness and also because we were slightly stunned. Our kids were filthy. I mean, dirty in the way that only small children can manage. Graydon had grime in the folds of his neck. Addie's feet were smell-able at ten paces due to her refusal to wear socks with her sneakers. Her face is sporting several scratches thanks to an attack by Graydon and more bug bites. We had been walking around Tokyo in 90 degree heat for several hours and no one was at their best. Some of us (ok, me) were decidedly at their worst, sporting streams of sweat, lank hair, approximately 86 mosquito bites and a broken foot. (Note: Yes, I have broken my foot. I wish I could say it was doing something coolly Japanese, like sumo wrestling or one of those game show obstacle courses, but alas, I simply walked into a chair.) No one wanted my picture, that's for sure, and the kids were not in much better condition.

In addition to THAT, the women taking pictures with them? They were in full kimono. Brilliant cloth bright with embroidery, flowers in their hair, those divided socks with the high wooden flip flops, fans in their hands, the whole stunning, glittering array of traditional Japanese attire, and all they wanted to do was take pictures with my dirty, cranky, corn-fed American kids. "Exotic" is very much a matter of perspective, it seems.

Sweaty. Bug bitten. Dirty. But those eyelashes...

And the dimples...

I guess they still are pretty cute.

And So It Began (A Christmas Season Retroblog)

Ah, December. My old nemesis, we meet again.

So pretty. So innocent. So calm and bright. SO DECEPTIVE.

Once again, I have been thoroughly defeated by the sheer unrelenting grind of birthday/birthday/holiday/birthday/holiday. Fortunately, it's a battle I don't mind losing because instead of nasty things like wounds and gangrene and post traumatic stress, we get lots of pictures and memories and family time. Oh, and presents. Those are nice too. The end result is much the same though, as January usually finds me locked into a quiet room, hunkered down with chocolates and a fat book, pretending that I do not own a phone or a computer, waving a white flag.

The biggest irony of blogging is that the busier you are, the more you want to record what is happening, and yet the less you have the capacity to do so. I'm quickly coming into acceptance of a new tradition: the January retroblog. We took a few weeks to recover, and here I am, attempting to retroblog no less than 570 pictures and about 571 memories. Don't worry, I won't share all of them. Just, you know, half of them. That seems reasonable.

In all seriousness, I thought I would just cut them up into smaller chunks and dole them out over the next few weeks. No one...by which I mean "me"...has the patience to page through tons of pictures saying things like "Opening Presents" for half an hour.

Without further ado, your first chunk. Sounds appealing, doesn't it? And yes, I did consider becoming a poet, but ultimately decided it would bring me too much fame and notoriety. I didn't want to sell out to the man.

So, it all began with tree decorating. Tim and I wanted to make it an event this year. We didn't do a tree last year, since we were headed to NC and then to Florida for three months. This year, we had hot cider and chocolate, Christmas carols, and a lovely fresh tree. Which I killed pretty quickly by forgetting to water it. But that was later.

Addie really got into everything. She wanted pictures with all her ornaments.

A good example of the "Mom, take a picture of me with THIS ornament" genre

She then proceeded to place all of her ornaments in basically the exact same place on the tree. Right at her eye level on one side. Any tactful suggestion to spread them out was immediately shot down. Every night Tim and I would redistribute only to have her move them back the next day. Sister knows what she likes.

Please notice the short sleeved shirt. I usually lay out a short sleeved shirt to (theoretically) go under a long shirt for layering purposes. The difficulty here is that Addie usually prefers her t shirts to her sweaters, so we end up with a lot of seasonally inappropriate clothing. Nothing says "Christmas" like cherries, I guess.  We've finally wised up and started buying only plain grey, white, and black shirts for layering.

Clustering, for the win!

 Graydon could have cared less about the whole process. He found one glittery train ornament and played with it all night. He did a surprisingly good job not breaking anything, and when I say "surprising", I actually mean downright shocking, because he usually wreaks havoc like a Texas twister.

In this picture, the train has found a sled ornament, which is now his "track". Pretty creative, I thought.

It's unfortunate that he's so shy.

I attempted to take a sibling picture of them in their jammies after it was all done, but yeah, it didn't work out. "Look at me, ok, smile!!! Or, yeah, you could just wrestle, that's fine."

Best shot of the series. All the others are just a blur of flailing limbs.

The very next day Ads had her preschool Christmas program. She'd been diligently practicing her "songs" for several weeks, mainly consisting of bursting into loud "HAAAAA LAY LOOO YAH!"s randomly and with great feeling, since they were singing the "Hallelujah" chorus from Handel's Messiah in part of the program. When I was in preschool I think we might have sung "Jingle Bells", but today's children are just way cooler than we were.

So, apparently, this is a big dress up occasion. I did not get this memo.

Here is my child, front and center. In her jeans.

I did think about it, and in fact, texted my friend Jen before the program to ask her if they were supposed to wear a certain color. I thought it was a little weird that they hadn't asked us to dress them all in red or green or whatever the hot color scheme of the moment might be. She said "I'm just dressing Calum in a reddish plaid shirt and his cords" so I thought "OK, yeah, I'll do a red shirt". I guess this is like one of those things that is so obvious they don't explain it, kind of like "Don't wear jeans to your wedding" or suchlike moments. 

To make matters worse, not only was my sweet girl totally underdressed, but I was late. Tim left for a conference in Colorado that day and I just couldn't get out the door in time by myself. So I had to literally RUN Addie into the school, catch the line before they filed in, and shove her into it. While carrying Graydon. And being pregnant. And swaddled in outdoor clothes because it was a balmy 10 out, which meant I then started streaming sweat from the combined effects of the subtropical heat of the school and stress. So I was super relaxed and ready to enjoy the evening ...or not...which wouldn't have mattered except poor Addie was terrified and didn't really understand what we were doing.

This is her filing into the auditorium, biting her nails, because she is nervous and has no idea what is going on.

 This wasn't my absolute nadir as a parent, sadly, but it didn't feel great. I felt like I set Addie up for a bad situation, because I know she needs time to relax and adjust and I didn't give her that. And I felt like an idiot for having the only girl child in jeans in the place. And because we were late, she was last in line, which meant she was front and center. She spent the entire time nervously twisting around to observe other kids. Except for the times she was picking her nose. It was about a 50/50 split, I'd say. I was so proud.

So much more interested in the other kids than in performing. Don't worry, I won't post pictures of her other activity.

Reliving this still makes me cringe, but I thought I would share because this was a milestone of sorts, and also because FYI PARENTS Christmas pageants are dress up occasions. I tried to give myself a pep talk like "Hey, ok, she's underdressed, no big deal! It's not her prom, right? And who are you trying to impress anyway? No one cares! All kids pick their noses sometimes. It will add a note of authenticity to the videos!" Then I just gave up on self pep talk and wished fervently for some red wine ...this was a theme throughout December, by the way.

With her friends and classmates, Calum, Briella, and Halle. I'm pretty sure Addie was upset at me too ;-)

Instead of drinking wine, I went home and made about 6 dozen cookies for the annual "Bone Wives n Hominy" Christmas cookie exchange the next day. Because 1) I'm pregnant and 2) I procrastinate. After a stressful and embarrassing evening, it is always therapeutic to bake enormous amounts of cookies to be given to other people, incidentally all extremely skilled chefs,  whilst simultaneously attempting to put two wild and overstimulated children to bed by yourself. I highly recommend this for your next frazzled state.

A small sample of the deliciousness

The good news is that sugar makes an excellent substitute for alcohol, and I had lots of yummy treats to eat after that gathering. I drowned my embarrassment in cookies and milk, and it was good that we had lots, because I wasn't quite done striking out yet with Addie and school. 

Lots of her friends go to the same preschool. Addie goes to the afternoon session on Tuesday and Thursday and some of her friends came to the cookie exchange in their pajamas because it was "Pajama Day" at preschool. I had NO idea this was happening, but knowing me, that's not really shocking. I mentally shrugged and sent Addie off to school in a pair of zip up footie pajamas with snowflakes and ice skaters on them. Only to see all the other kids in her class in regular clothes and her teacher looking slightly confused upon seeing Addie. I tried explaining "Oh, some of her friends at a playdate said it was Pajama Day..." and trailed off in feeble silence while Mrs. Batterson laughed in sympathy and explained that was only for the 5 year old class. Oh. OK. Well, that's cool. Not only did I send Addie to her pageant in jeans, I also sent her to school the next day in pajamas. At 12:30 in the afternoon. Like I just couldn't quite summon the energy to dress my child that day.

Thank heavens I can laugh about it now, because of course December got so much easier after that. I only had to plan two birthday parties, start finish Christmas preparations, do the holidays with Tim's family, and then host my family's visit. Easy peasy for an organized and efficient person. Like me. I would say those are the top two words that people use to describe me.*

Yeah. I ate a lot of cookies that month. 

*If you don't know me, this is not true at all. Once I was bemoaning my chronic lack of organization and my friend Jen very sweetly and tactfully said "Well, Tara, I would say you're of a more artistic mindset". And there you have it.